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Vital Signs: "We Can Take His Heart Out, Remove the Tumor, and Put It Back In"
A patient’s heart tumor is all but inaccessible to his surgeons. The only way to deal with it: Remove the heart and operate on it outside the body. 05.09.2012
The Lethal Gene That Emerged in Ancient Palestine and Spread Around the Globe
A long line of discoveries shows the history and biology of the world's most studied piece of DNA, a mutation that causes breast cancer. 03.05.2012
#38: Killing Cancer From The Inside
Three new studies suggest ways to home in on cancer cells during treatment, leaving surrounding healthy tissue unharmed. 01.05.2012
#87: First Posthumous Nobel Awarded
Immunologist Ralph Steinman won the Nobel Prize in Medicine days after his death. 01.05.2012
#60: New Treatments Slow Deadly Skin Cancer
Two treatments that boost the immune system improve survival rates and slow cancer growth in late-stage melanoma patients. 01.05.2012
#55: Coffee Vs. Cancer
Drinking one extra cup of coffee a day is linked to a 3 percent reduction in cancer risk. 01.05.2012
#10: Immune Supercells Purge Leukemia
A new therapy turns leukemia patients’ own cells into cancer assassins. It may one day help fight other cancers, too. 01.05.2012
Are Cancers Actually New Species of Life? Probably Not—and It Doesn't Matter
Don't believe everything you read on the Internet. 07.29.2011
What Will Our Telomeres Tell Us?
Nobel Prize–winner Elizabeth Blackburn's company will soon begin selling a test of telomere length to consumers. Whether that information will actually help improve people's health remains to be seen. 05.18.2011
Dead People Science Won't Let R.I.P.
Medical researchers are determined to unearth the truth about these historical figures' lives and deaths: Eight tales of delayed diagnosis and extreme postmortems. 02.08.2011
The Timeless and Trendy Effort to Find—or Create—the Fountain of Youth
In the quest for longer life, scientists are trying to find the genes of longevity and bottle their benefits for all. 02.07.2011
#18: Helper Gene Makes Cancer Deadly
12.16.2010
The 100 Top Science Stories of 2010
Every year DISCOVER sorts through the scientific accomplishments of the past 12 months, and assembles a list of the coolest experiments, most brilliant discoveries, and most world-changing events. As you page through the countdown to the #1 science story, we think you'll come to the same conclusion we did: 2010 was quite a year. 12.16.2010
Can a Pill Keep Your DNA Young?
The first drug targeting telomeres, now sold as a nutritional supplement, will soon face the harsh light of peer review. 06.11.2010
Genetic Medicine Goes Nano
More researchers are using nanoparticles to deliver lethal toxins specifically to cancer cells, leaving regular cells unharmed. 04.14.2010
#52: Courts Consider Who Owns the Human Genome
Myriad Genetics owns the patent over certain breast cancer genes, effectively giving them ownership over any test involving the genes. 01.03.2010
Vital Signs: Confusing Cues
A spreading rash signals something far more dangerous than a skin condition. 11.02.2009
Sauerkraut, Mustard, Relish, and (Slightly Increased Risk of) Cancer
For anyone who thought hot dogs were the healthiest food around, some new research will come as a sad surprise. 10.16.2009
The Big Idea That Might Beat Cancer and Cut Health-Care Costs by 80 Percent
Paul Ewald says infections are responsible for at least four-fifths of all cancers—and we have the tools to prevent them. 09.30.2009
A New Rx for Cancer: Ignore It (Sometimes)
Dr. H. Gilbert Welch says cancer treatments are often worse than the tumors—especially because some of them go away naturally. 09.25.2009
A Modest Proposal: How to Stop Aging Entirely
Biologist Aubrey de Grey lays out a plan to stay young forever. Key step: finally winning the war on cancer. 09.23.2009
Vital Signs: Running Out of Life's Blood
A dying patient faces a dropping blood count—and a faith that forbids transfusions. 05.28.2009
Vital Signs: A Gland Failure
When adrenal functions go out of whack, the mind and body respond in startling ways. 03.29.2009
The Truth About McCain's Melanoma: He Faces a Very Low Risk
For all the air and ink spent on it, most people have missed the essential point. 10.29.2008
10 Ways Genetically Engineered Microbes Could Help Humanity
Fighting cancer, producing renewable fuels, and making your clothing glow in the dark. 08.06.2008
The Man Who Lost His Name—and His Genetic Identity
Eric Drew miraculously recovered from both cancer and identity theft. 04.09.2008
The Cancer That Itches
A "deep" itch can signal that something's really wrong. 02.15.2008
Hope May Be Useless Against Cancer
New study finds that being happy won't help you live longer. 02.11.2008
The New Anticancer Weapon: Fetal Cells
Cellular stowaways may be able see through cancer cells' disguises. 01.07.2008
Scientist of the Year Notable: Elizabeth Blackburn
Her genetic explorations could lead to revolutionary treatments for cancer. 12.06.2007
Expert: Modern Chemicals Brought Cancer Epidemic
First tobacco. Then asbestos. Now we're awash in a sea of new poisons. 11.08.2007
World Plague Center
Philip Landrigan tracks the massive health fallout from breathing NY air after 9/11. 09.07.2007
The Body Can Beat Terminal Cancer — Sometimes
They should be dead. But a tiny number of people conquer lethal diseases. 08.21.2007
Why Is the HPV Vaccine So Expensive?
Good for the cervix, rough on the pocketbook 06.11.2007
The First Nuclear Refugees Come Home
Chernobyl-area natives return to find a city of ghosts. 06.08.2007
Everything Emits Radiation—Even You
The millirems pour in from bananas, bomb tests, the air, bedmates... 06.04.2007
How We Got the Controversial HPV Vaccine
It took more than 30 years—and mice grafted with infected human foreskins. 05.17.2007
Tanning Beds and Cancer
Long chided for rising skin cancer rates, sun exposure may provide essential doses of Vitamin D. And the tanning bed industry's happy to hear it. 08.15.2006
Firefly Rx
How your favorite summertime insect may be illuminating drug research. 08.10.2006
Are You Immune to Cancer?
Scientists find a strain of super-mice that just can't get cancer. 08.01.2006
Smoking and Ethnicity
Scientists try to pin down why African Americans are statistically less successful at quitting smoking. 07.07.2006
Taking the Sting Out of Brain Cancer
A new drug treatment uses scorpion venom to find tumors. 06.30.2006
Cancer Rewind?
Reversing cell division could have implications for cancer. 06.27.2006
Vital Signs: Why Is She Getting Thinner?
Linking stomach pain, diabetes, and weight loss saves a life 05.29.2006
Outrunning Melanoma
Exercise may prevent skin cancer. 05.25.2006
Rub That Cancer Away
03.03.2006
Secrets of Redheads
Secrets of Redheads 11.22.2005
Killing Cancer With Red-Hot Nanotubes
Killing Cancer With Red-Hot Nanotubes 11.22.2005
The Emperor's Trousers
08.06.2005
Vital Signs
A song from Shrek helps a 5-year-old boy recover from difficult surgery 08.06.2005
Secrets of Longevity
06.06.2005
How Our Hair Turns Gray
05.01.2005
Revoking Leukemia's License to Kill
03.31.2005
7: New Drugs Target Cancer
01.03.2005
93: Broccoli Kicks Cancer
01.03.2005
34: Prostate Cancer Test Questioned
01.03.2005
38: Caution: Farmed Salmon May Cause Cancer
01.02.2005
Cancer's Master Genes
11.25.2004
Medicine: Napoleone Ferrara
11.25.2004
Lassie—Get the Oncologist!
11.15.2004
Found: The Anticancer Sponge
03.28.2004
Medicine
01.02.2004
The Greatest Unanswered Questions of Medical Science
Where the money and brainpower will go in the next decade 12.03.2003
Killer Cancer in the Cretaceous
11.03.2003
Vital Signs
New thinking about an old disease 08.01.2003
Another Risk from DDT
08.01.2003
Vital Signs
She looked healthy, yet the X ray suggested she would soon die 05.01.2003
The scientist who hated abortion
Endocrinologist Joel Brind says research has shown him the truth about abortion, and that's why he set out on a crusade that now reaches into the heart of the nation's most powerful cancer agency. But what if he's wrong? 02.01.2003
Free Radical
The eminent, controversial, and endlessly inventive biochemist Bruce Ames thinks he has found a way to slow the aging process in the brain. May the force be with him 10.01.2002
Discover Data: Cancer's Reversal of Fortunes
09.01.2002
Bad Science and Breast Cancer
For more than a decade, physicians convinced breast cancer patients that bone marrow transplants were their best hope of salvation. But the insurance companies who resisted paying for the procedures were right all along: It was experimental medicine and most women were a lot better off without it. How could so many oncologists ignore basic principles of science? 08.01.2002
Sky Lights
Radiation levels are up and our satellite is down 02.01.2002
By the Numbers: Smoke Gets in Your Hair
01.01.2002
Vital Signs
For more than a century, the key to cancer therapy has always been, Wait for the pathology report 08.01.2001
Children of Chernobyl
08.01.2001
Works in Progress
Perhaps, but the side effects could get you too 06.01.2001
I Have Seen Cancers Disappear'
When Steven Rosenberg was young, the Nazis killed his aunts and uncles one by one. When he was older, cancer killed his patients one by one. That connection just might save our lives 05.01.2001
Arjun Makhijani The Nuke Slayer
04.01.2001
Worrying About Milk
08.01.2000
Cutting Back on Chemotherapy
04.01.2000
Open Sesame
04.01.2000
A New Red Line
11.01.1999
Code of Denial
Doctors have a dispassionate language for talking to really sick patients. But it doesn't work with people they love. 10.01.1999
Cancer Warning Light
07.01.1999
Got Cancer Killers?
Breast-feeding protects babies from cancer, but no one knows quite how. So when biologists in Catharina Svanborg's lab saw mothers' milk kill cancer cells, they knew they were onto something big. 06.01.1999
Goodbye to Mammograms
06.01.1999
Saurian Sore
10.01.1998
A Head Full of Hope
How do you launch something into orbit without using any fuel? A prototype spacecraft relies on a To attack a terrifying form of brain tumor, surgeons are adding a tiny new tool to their kit: a genetically tweaked virus, designed to mark cancer cells for death. 04.01.1998
Vital Signs: Final Battles
Mrs. Chang's life had not been easy. Now she was afraid her death wouldn't be, either. 03.01.1998
The Year in Science: Environment 1997
Iodine Wind 01.01.1998
The Year in Science: Medicine 1997
Tobacco Row 01.01.1998
Malign Evolution
In 1911 a hen's tumor prompted a 70-year search for cancer-causing viruses. What it ultimately revealed were the rules of a Darwinian game, played to the death. 08.01.1997
A Healing Light
06.01.1997
Ten Years After
01.01.1997
The Player
11.01.1996
Fetal Errors
07.01.1996
Beyond the Lab Rat
By examining humans at the molecular level, researchers hope to pin down cancer's true causes. 05.01.1996
A New Kind of Glitch
12.01.1995
A Gift of the Gods
10.01.1995
A Vaccine Against Cervical Cancer
07.01.1995
Analysis of a Toxic Death
A year ago two dozen emergency room staff were mysteriously felled by fumes emanating from a dying young woman. Investigations turned up nothing--until a team of chemists from a nuclear weapons lab got involved. 04.01.1995
Vital Signs: The Aretha Franklin Test
03.02.1995
A Mortal Science
09.01.1994
Watch Where You Walk
04.01.1994
Magic Missiles
We need a kinder way to kill cancer--one that doesn't destroy the patient as well. 03.01.1993
No Longer Human
12.01.1992
The Lazarus Mice
07.01.1992
Stopping the Crab
03.01.1992
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